Where to begin? Oh, probably with some unexciting stuff. I do have some enthralling material later, but let’s get some minutia out of the way.

It sounds so simple. Take two days off from work. Fly out to Madison on Thursday, fly back on Sunday. No commitments other than True Dungeon. Take L5R to play when bored and take Traveller to show off.

I kind of forget what it’s like to fly East. Set alarm for like 3AM to get up and finish packing before getting to airport and being delayed half an hour because of undownloaded paperwork. Set alarm for 4:30AM after Daylight Saving Time ends, in the dark, at 2:30AM, to head back. Sure, we could sleep in twice, but, then, there’s the “what the hell are we going to do with all of these tokens we just acquired?” phase of the con.

Everyone else, even Californians who flew out, seemed to really like GHC. I didn’t. Oh, I don’t think it’s the con’s fault. I think it’s the city’s fault, in part. The convention center is isolated, so you can’t just run over to a restaurant and run back between games. The food trucks and stalls didn’t have bad food, just food I didn’t want (well, the smoothie that was $2 more than it should have been was desirable tasting).

The hotel was loud – first night seemed like a helicopter flew right over the building. Okay, that’s unusual and hard to control for. Next two nights could hear our neighbors talking clearly, and I’m sure they could hear us talking clearly. Doesn’t it get cold in the North? Would think sturdier buildings.

Our one opportunity to go out for food was okay (if expensive). Always amusing to go to Wisconsin for your Laotian food. I wonder if the pork tod mun would have been better as beef, and the beef Lao paradise meat would have been better as pork. Might have fixed the texture oddities the two appetizers had. The main dishes were good. Who doesn’t like deep fried noodles? I could get even further off topic by talking about ratings for food as I travel, but let’s get around to gaming at some point.

We played a game of L5R Thursday night.

Friday

Three True Dungeon runs and True Grind. Since there were only two dungeons, a lot of stuff just runs together.

I think I played monk on the first run, cleric on the second, ranger on the third. Did play ranger in Grind.

The first two runs weren’t terribly notable, except some general views on the changes from Gen Con.

I didn’t like Dancing at Gen Con. I loved Moongate at Gen Con. I actually wasn’t terribly fond of Moongate at GHC and thought Dancing was respectable at GHC. Switching out one of the puzzles in Dancing improved it. Sure, the fights were still not great, one of which was actually ridiculously pointless on normal and hardcore because of how little damage was dealt. Moongate suffered from having too little combat. And, while I understand why it was used and we even somehow solved it on our third run of Moongate, it had a puzzle I hate … not hated … hate. Plus, it had a puzzle I was over with the second time I ran Moongate at Gen Con.

Then, came run three. We played hardcore, with six players, three of which lacked much experience, and two of which didn’t have hardcore level builds. What’s a hardcore level build? Hard to quantify outside of my view that you should never play hardcore with less than 30 hit points and shouldn’t play nightmare with less than 40. If we had a full party, probably would have been more enjoyable.

So, we got to the second fight and we got wrecked. Two players were a round away from dying. I took 42 damage. I figured we were doomed at that point, even though we got through the room. Look, the point of challenge level is to be challenging, not to be “well, you asked for it”. The fight didn’t scale based on our party size, and I still contend that it should due to how it worked. If it worked differently, then, sure, don’t adjust it for underadventurered parties.

Now, we did the exact opposite of what you are supposed to do in another room. After that amusing fiasco, I knew we were going to get wiped fast in room seven. In some ways, that was a good thing. For, you see, in none of the other six runs were Andy and I challenged. Now, some of that had to do with knowing the solutions to many of the puzzles from Gen Con. A lot of that had to do with my whining about playing a loser paladin who only ran around with 60 hit points, unlike my 77 hit point monk. Of the seven runs, I think three were normal and four hardcore. When we played with nightmare level players, we also had party members who could never be relevant at nightmare except as victims.

So, we were challenged and end room wiped. Something else happened during this run. I used consumables. I never use consumables because that’s like burning money, in a way. Not only did I hand out potions, but I actually used a Mystic Mushroom to bring someone back to life. That’s right. I finally used a token to bring someone back to life. That’s actually more like what TD should be when you play a combat run.

There’s an argument that the reason to rein in the Eldritch healing bonus is because it makes runs boring with how easily clerics/druids mass heal parties. Having played various ultrarare builds on normal difficulty, I totally get the idea of not feeling like there’s anything at stake, anymore.

We went to play Grind. Before I get into some facets of that experience, I’ll note that while talking to Andy about how the last run went, I realized that I had completely forgotten: I was psychic and could heal 4 hit points; 5th level ranger has a healing spell; I was wearing both a Linked Shirt of Healing and Pants of Blisswalk to get bonuses from Andy’s healing spells. I may also have forgotten Icecrag healing at times.

Then, I failed to murder a puppy.

In True Grind, we played with six players who didn’t know anything about what TG is like, which is reasonable as I didn’t know what TG was like until … until … I played it. More problematic may have been that they really didn’t have the tokens to be playing Grind.

Though, our bigger problem wasn’t combat effectiveness … no matter how much the giant head and neck of the puppy evaded my +18 to hit with my +2 Keen Slayer Longbow. Our biggest problem was indecisiveness. At Gen Con, with a similar plot, the group made decisions, mostly to fight, and it was good. With this group, we kept not knowing whether to fight or not.

It was amusing. Besides missing every single attempt to put an arrow in a puppy’s head, I did get devoured by a Gazebo – the just punishment for not being a “I guess I Mad Evoker’s Charm my Lightning Storm and Ring of Spell Storing my Charm of Spell Swappinged Magic Missile” wizard.

Worst ranger ever. I think it only fitting I never play ranger again. “Oh, crap, I had spells!?!” I didn’t even remember to cast Barkskin, which I talked about doing before we started playing.

If you’ve survived to this point, let’s say I’ll go over what I thought of playing different classes after I explain Saturday.

Saturday

It is pretty sweet to have transmuting when you want to transmute. We got 50 treasure pull bags and got mostly junk, which is to be expected. We did finally get an ultrarare in like our sixth bag, maybe fifth bag. We tried to put together trade item transmutes to cut weight.

For, you see, TD is really all about reducing how many tokens you have. TD is all about cutting weight. As Leftcoastians, we fly. Now, if United or Southwest, we can get by with weight. But, even so, I had to correct the counter person that I could have two overweight bags at my status level. If you are kind of dim and fail to comprendez the problem, plastic tokens with metal inside of them weigh a lot, especially when their owners aren’t too organized and bring extra stuff to try to get rid of it only to realize that you constantly get more stuff you want to get rid of and don’t have time to because you need to get back home before work starts.

Four runs, including the last Dancing run. I played paladin in our first run, our only run organized ahead of time through the forums – one of our better runs … hmmmmm … could there be a connection? Then, I played monk, bard, and, finally, paladin.

Beginning with the ending, because save the best for last, our last run was so easy that I guarded someone squishy and never received any damage on a combat run at hardcore. See below for more on playing a paladin.

Will get to playing a bard in a moment.

I found monk to be rather pleasant. Of course, I was playing a ranged monk, as all “geniuses” do. See … no, screw it, let me talk about ranged builds now.

Ranged Builds

I was told that in Kirk’s DMing class/seminar on Thursday night that the most common or one of the most common mistakes by room DMs is using melee stats for people using ranged weapons. I believe, though I’m old and increasingly senile, on every single one of my seven TD runs (not my TG run, of course), there was at least one room that the DM used my melee stats when I never used a melee weapon. Yup, in seven runs, including playing cleric(!!) and monk(!!), I played seven ranged builds.

I’m trying to get increasingly efficient with tokens and it’s just really easy to use the same high Dex builds for every class.

On some runs, it was particularly egregious how my attack mode was ignored. In the only challenging run, my melee stats were used in the room that doomed us. Look, I’m into being a sidekick. I’m good with others murdering puppies better than I. But, when I’m needed to impale fae spiders, I kind of want to be impaletastic.

I’m aware enough to call out that someone should use my ranged stats on a challenging run. My bard can bury my strength so deep that I get -2 to hit and the DM realizes that can’t be right. (Btw, when I played bard with a STR of 6, I was also hauling around a 30 pound backpack for 8 hours of upright gaming.) But, what about other poor schleps who don’t scream bloody puppymurder?

Rating

It was not a bad experience. It was a learning experience. What we learned is that there’s not really any reason for us to go to GHC again. We could have been at the L5R Worlds, at a HoR con. All we really did was play True events and it was repetitive and below great. Yeah, I’m cool with the idea of getting to know other forumites better, etc. I just don’t need this particular setup to do more of the same.

Ratings

Bard

I don’t want to play bard again. Maybe it would work in a run where I knew everyone. But, it’s not the awkwardness of singing that sapped my enthusiasm while I was playing, it was that bard has too many options. I could lore, I could bardsong, I could attack, I could scroll, I could cast. Just too many options where I’m not that into any one of the options.

Andy’s girlfriend did ask about highlights of the experience. I did eventually remember that having like four attacks succeed … in one round … because of bardsong was a highlight.

Cleric

I only played cleric on a run where challenge was so irrelevant that nobody even bothered skill checking me. Hello, why do we play the game? We play the game to pass skill checks through being suprageniusy at memorization.

I studied beads. I never studied beads before. I … I … *weep* … never got to prove I could identify a bead. My soul has been crushed.

I hated playing cleric, anyway. As I figured would happen, I was just constantly in “do you need any healing?” mode, which is tiresome. I want spells that can burn any puppies who blink at me.

Monk

Good times. Originally, I pegged monk as one of the classes I would never want to play. Then, I won an auction for a crossbow, and I realized it would be perfect to be a crossbowing monk with saves greater than that of God. I didn’t go full overboard saves with my GHC build, but I was pleased with my +14/+5 ranged monk build, playing either normal or hardcore. On hardcore, maybe I switch into Bracers of Supreme Archery for more damage, but whatever. I’m not sure how, but I was doing like 21 damage with some shots. Not sure where bonuses were coming from that would have got me there.

Maybe I create some sort of thematic monk character to get into character. Or, I just impale things with bolts instead of useless puppymurderfailing arrows.

Paladin

Two runs, two not remotely in danger scenarios. But, I did learn one thing. Every DM I had avoided attacking me or my ward(s). I’m pretty senilesure that nobody I guarded and not my own personage were ever targeted for attacks. That’s something that maybe someone can abuse in a meta way. It’s also a bunch of crap. The point of having abilities is using them.

The irony was that I was playing a paladin build that didn’t have an unusually good AC and had relatively poor hit points. I was guarding the ranger on one of the runs, too.

Ranger

Dead to me. Devoured and fertilized in the great gazebo planes.

Wizard

Not a single wizard or elf wizard play. That was good. Fighters are mindnumbing to me, rogue would only be tolerable in Grind, druid was so close but I didn’t have a build built because I don’t expect to be able to play druid, barbarian is just too brutal for sensibilities except maybe on nightmare where I can unleash.

Next

Finally, I can get someone to go to Origins. Now, I can play in the V:TES NAC with TD as … a time competitor?!?

What denotes the difference between a talking head spouting opinion from an analyst?

Real analysis is scientific. The intent is to prove something by using … evidence.

Someone posted to an old thread on the TD forums about best choice for a PYP from the 2016 list for a fighter. Now, I can’t imagine why anyone would want to play fighter. Sure, I’d play fighter over any of dwarf fighter, monk, or rogue, but at least the last two have some sort of interesting component to them. But, more power to people who like things I don’t when it only helps me do what I want to do.

My choice was Kvothe’s Bloodless. Now, again, because I have no interest in fighter, more generally usable tokens are going to be more appealing to me. I chose this over +1 Mighty Sling, any of the Redoubt Set, Goggles of Instant Analysis, and less relevant things.

Redoubt Set. I posted my complete lack of interest in armor and my especial lack of interest in taking save hits. Well, guess what? Plan to have a Redoubt Set by end of Gen Con. This is what comes from “value” bids on eBay and a ridiculous glut of Blessed Redoubt Plate. Now, I actually have to think about whether to trade the whole thing away or to actually upgrade to Blessed Redoubt Helm and Blessed Redoubt Shield for extra lunacy.

Anyway, I remain unconvinced normal Redoubt is good, so my thought is that anyone looking to get into the set should just figure on spending $700-1000 for a complete Blessed Set … like all true Tycoons are wont to do.

The power of +1 Mighty Sling has only grown on me as I run through various character builds. The big downfall of my madness is that Mighty Sling is pretty much the same token for $85 or whatever less. Again, for a fighter this may not be as sweet and delicious as other possibilities, such as the rumored reprint of +1 Mighty Longbow next year, but it’s an any class play, which means I just throw it into cleric builds to fill out a ranged slot and because likely no one else in our group would need to run it. We are Strange. Team Strange. Or, Team Echo. Or, Team Blow. Well, someday, aspire to Blow.

Goggles of Instant Analysis does not make virtually any of my builds. I like attributes. I have a Lenses of the Fae. I may not be helping melee beatdown, but melee beatdown is the most boring form of beatdown to me, so give me +3 Dex and maybe I don’t miss incorporeals, either. Still, I get that a fighter who probably is going to melee is going to wonder what else to bother with that is anywhere close to +2 to hit.

Speaking of +2 to hit, I’ve asked about alt builds in case we don’t just play our preferred classes, and Dave mentioned being okay with fighting but wants hit bonuses. Quite often, forumites talk of hit bonuses. One of the benefits of having a character builder handy is that I can see numbers in a more numbery way. I kind of get the need to weed over the need to bleed the more I see how easy ramping damage versus becoming a hit god is. Even my fighty builds don’t get vast, potentially oversized, on hit-eration.

Now, it was pointed out to me that Kvothe’s Bloodless sounds better than it is for TD. Wait, what? Then, what? The contrasts with TG – True Grind – are frequent. Often talk about how builds change for TG, and that’s a good thing, assuming you can get into any slots of TG, which seems unlikely given our schedules at GC, though there were openings open for slots I couldn’t make.

How much beatdown will you suffer in TD? Little sayeth the pros (and, believe me, given the buy in possibilities, pro is not far from the truth). Time is the mindkiller. The fear, when tooled up to ultra levels, is puzzle-ing because combat is one round of monster slayage or so the impression upon me has been made. Of course, that may not be the case for Team Strange. We don’t relish firepower of the eldritch god … er … set. We eschew double Viper Fang attacks. Our DPS (damage per slide) is within reason and two Strangers are preferred on cleric and bard who sit around contemplating the inadequacies of the beatdowners.

It’s slotless. Bloodless, that is. Slotless is my new slot since, sadly in a world where retirement savings matter, I don’t really need any more tokens to run hardcore or nightmare. I just need wisdom. Oh, the injokes you don’t get.

So, I’m sure this is utterly fascinating in every way, but how can we make this even more opinionated … uh … analytical?

2016 was not a good year for ultrarares. Sure, Amulet of the Champion makes many of my builds, so there’s that powercreep. And, Boots of the South Wind allowed for Boots of the Four Winds, which is like better than Shirt of the Three Dragons (ooh, ooh, proposed token path, except already have the Kilt set in progress; maybe pretend the three year Kilt is the dragon complement). But, if you take each individual ultrarare, it’s just hard to get excited in the same way that 2017 gets one enflamed.

There are 2017 tokens I still see as important. Sure, there are narrow use, “I don’t value this above like $70” ultrarares I wouldn’t mind having for amusement, like Amulet of Guarding and Belt of Thorns, but I still see greed, I mean, need, nope, greed in 2017. Hopefully, 2018 has a paucity of Strange seduction.

Time to go anti-analytical. So, it’s hard not to keep running the good stuff in builds to be as twinked out as possible on the path of Suitcasedom. But, I have thought of a colorful pastime. What do you think when I say …

RED, BLUE, and … and … maybe I’ll wear a white shirt. USA! USA! Only in Statesland can you run around with five figure character builds for TD/TG … until we export it! USA! USA!

On this day, this day when the Continental Congress voted for independence, we will consider the red, blue, and TBD white build.

Belt of Blessed Constitution, Steelclad Cloak, Charm of Health, Exalted Creeper Amulet, Greater Arcane Scrolltube, Shirt of Blessed Strength all are the bluest of the blue that we zoo. That’s not much of a fill. Okay, reds. Who gets slammed by weakosity if they go down from purple to red?

Well, I expect to have a couple Defender Sets by sometime during Gen Con. That doesn’t offend my sensibilities. The ranged weapon is obvious if you, like, can read minds. Please don’t read my mind. Seppuku for me. Let’s assume that this is TG for funsies, so treasure enhancers aren’t needed.

Boots of Agility makes a lot of my builds. Pants of Blisswalk. Bracers of Archery goes with Exalted Creeper Amulet or any of Bracers of Fire/Frost/Lightning. Gloves of Spell Negation is something I consider running in certain builds already; there’s always Gauntlets of Ogre Power.

Lenses of Focus would only work for a class that can’t Defender, so Goggles of Seeking if we have any. Cloak of Resistance +2 makes pretty much all of my builds. Oh, I should mention we have, for the moment, three Cloaks of Shadowskin, guess I was wrong about its brokenness as I don’t see the point in almost any of my builds. Still, hang on to two just in case.

Charm of the Sipquick is ubiquitous in my builds. Charm of Enlightenment if we had enough to go around. Really should be reprinted. Also should be printed is another way to pump Wisdom. Oh, and all right-thinking True types need more Rings of Greater Focus, so reprint Ring of Focus and a relic recipe.

Earcuff of Vitality. I don’t know if we own any Ramparts. Ring of Dark Health and a variety of rings we may or may not have.

This isn’t bad. As soon as I become a jaded TDer/TGer, which should take like two more runs or who knows, I’ll totally embrace USA! USA! … or, on Arbor Day, go green for that all uncommon build. Green and purple? Green and black would look stylin’ and profilin’, but am I that deep pocketed to blacken my world?

Stay tuned. Onyx do look sharp. Of course, black and red looks spiffy. Black and blue, eh, the blue is too cartoonish. Black and orange … stop, just stop, just just go back to talking about L5R 4e, which is free, and V:TES which only costs travel and Shadowfist, which is free.